The present invention relates to an operation unit for controlling an air conditioning system by operation members being operated.
As an operation unit, there is an operation unit in which a plurality of operation members such as an air amount adjustment knob, a temperature control knob and key tops are on an operation panel (for example, refer to Japanese Patent No. 3317848).
In this operation unit, rear sides of the plurality of operation members are covered by a case, and a printed circuit board is attached to a rear side of the case. Lamps and light emitting diodes are provided on the printed circuit board, and the lamps and light emitting diodes are inserted into an interior of the case for illuminating the plurality of operation members.
In this operation unit, however, the rear sides of the plurality of operation members are covered by only the single case. Because of this, when the design of the operation unit is changed by changing the arrangement of the plurality of operation members on the operation panel, the case cannot cover the rear sides of the plurality of operation members so changed in their arrangement, whereby there is caused a problem that the design of the operation unit is difficult to be changed and hence, the degree of freedom in changing the design of the operation unit is reduced.
Here, when the case is divided into a plurality of cases, even in the event that the arrangement of the plurality of operation members on the operation panel is changed so as to change the design of the operation unit, the rear sides of the plurality of operation members can be covered by the plurality of cases. Because of this, the degree of freedom in design of the operation unit can be increased.
In this case, however, in the event that a printed circuit board is provided for each case, the necessity is caused of providing a lamp or a light emitting diode for each printed circuit board and this then causes the necessity of connecting a wiring harness to each printed circuit board, leading to a problem that the production costs are increased.